The transfer of power from Sheikh Hamad to his son, Sheikh Tamim, is mere window dressing. It will have little impact on the tiny sheikhdom’s policies.
With the opening of the Taliban office in Doha, Qatar, Hamid Karzai feels he will be left to hang high and dry if the Americans strike a deal with the resistance group. He has hit his now-familiar tantrum to be noticed. Will he get anywhere with it?
It is truly shocking that the Saudis and Qataris would stoop so low as to target vulnerable Syrian refugees in camps in Jordan and Turkey. Muslim should take note against these corrupters and take steps to get rid of them.
The visit of the Emir of Qatar to besieged Gaza Strip has led to much discussion. Was it merely to express solidarity with the Palestinians or there was a broader political objective?
When it hit the airwaves in 1996, Al-Jazeera took the Arab world by storm. Compared to the sterile reporting of government-controlled channels in the Arab world, Al-Jazeera came as a breath of fresh air, although the better informed knew this was a mirage. Al-Jazeera was slick and took on some subjects (though not all) that the rest of the Arab media dared not broach.
The announcement on April 29 by US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld that American troops and aircraft would be moved out of Saudi Arabia by the end of the summer does not mean the end of trouble for the ruling al-Saud family.
Recent reports that US forces were preparing to leave their bases in Saudi Arabia created the initial impression that the US’s military presence in the Gulf Cooperation Council states was about to be reduced...
The peace deal signed in Doha, Qatar, by Sudan’s president Omar al-Bashir and his Eritrean counterpart Issaias Afwerki on May 2 has left Sudanese opposition groups in disarray, with some, like former prime minister Sadiq al-Mahdi, simultaneously holding secret and separate talks with other Sudanese officials.
The failure of the fourth Middle East-North Africa (MENA) Economic Conference in Doha, Qatar (November 16-18), boycotted by most Arab countries despite strong US pressure to attend, has triggered guarded optimism that the summit of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC)...
